


One step after the other

by Fleur_de_Violette



Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Mira teaching Natsu how to dance, Tumblr Prompt, cute (I hope), dance, feeling ensues, for kuntasage-11
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-28
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2019-07-03 17:23:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15823515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fleur_de_Violette/pseuds/Fleur_de_Violette
Summary: Natsu couldn’t believe how stupid he was sometimes. He just wanted to show off in front of Lucy, and now, he was left with a night to learn how to dance. And even him knew there was no way he was doing this without a teacher.





	One step after the other

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! So this is a short fic written for kuntasage-11 on tumblr who asked for Mira teaching Natsu how to dance. I hope you’ll like it!

The guild after eleven and half in the night was a totally different world. 

If the building stayed open all night, the bar wasn’t, and that was enough to get most guild members out of the place. Where the bar was noisy and overflowing with life during the day, it turned calm and soft with the night. 

And while he enjoyed the guild by day, Natsu thought there was something mystic about this ambiance. Pure. Enchanting. 

He could almost ear the night fairies dancing in the shadows, now that all the day fairies were gone. 

All but two: Mirajane, who was quietly humming while washing the counter, and him, who was slowly making up his mind to ask what he needed to.   
Sometimes, he couldn’t believe his own stupidity.

He had send Happy home to get some sleep: they were supposed to go on a mission with the rest of the team in the morning after all. 

They were supposed to go on a mission, and that was the whole problem. 

When Lucy had asked him if he knew how to rock dance, a necessary skill for this request, he had told her that there was no problem at all. He didn’t want to disappoint his friend, whose eyes were shining when she had looked at the request, and it couldn’t be that difficult. He had basic knowledge in music and knew his body, he was confident that he could master any dance relatively easily. Besides, even if it was hard and he had to humiliate himself, he would at least have the consolation of seeing Grey suffering the same discomfort. 

Oh, how wrong he was. 

Because, while discussing the mission, the constellationist and the ice magician had agreed to dance a few steps together. 

And Natsu had realized two things: 

One: the dance wasn’t trivial at all. In fact, it seemed very difficult. 

Two: both Grey and Lucy were extremely good. 

And where the hell could the ice magician had acquired such a skill? Lucy was from an aristocratic bloodline, so he could understand that she had some hidden talents such as dancing, but Grey? He had no idea. 

But he had more important things to do than satisfying his own curiosity. 

He needed to learn how to rock dance. Before tomorrow morning.

Because now that he had seen his rival’s perfect movements, it wasn’t about failing the mission or face a humiliation. 

Now this was personal. He needed to know how to dance, and he needed to be able be at least as graceful as the other boy. 

And for that, he needed a teacher. Even he had to admit that he couldn’t master such a skill on his own. 

He couldn’t ask Lucy, having showed off in front of her, there was no way he would ask Grey, and while he was sure that Erza knew how to rock dance, or at least had a dress that allowed her to do that, he wanted to keep all his bones unbroken before departing on a quest.

That left only person he could ask. The only person of the guild who shared with Erza and the master the capability to do everything.   
Mirajane. 

So here he was, sitting at a table in the guild, gathering the courage to ask his friend.

His train of thought was interrupted by the said friend who want nonchalantly sitting in front of him.   
“May I help you with something, Natsu?” 

Mira wore her usual reassuring smile. The Dragon Slayer tried to be as nonchalant as possible.   
“Yeah, I was wandering if you knew how to…”

“Rock dance? Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.” 

The fire magician shallowed. There was practically nothing that happened in the guild without Mira being aware of it, and, being a member since his childhood, he was supposed to know it, but sometimes, the take over magician still surprised him. Of course, the woman never lost her smile.

“You want me to teach you, right?” 

Well, that made things a lot easier. The younger mage shot up from his chair, looking everywhere but his friend’s eyes. 

“Well… yeah…” 

Mirajane clapped her hands together. 

“Ok then. Help me move the tables so they don’t get in the way.” 

Within fifteen minutes, all the tables were gathered near the walls, and the bar had become an improvised dance floor. The woman put one of her friend’s hands in hers and placed the on her lower back.

“We’re gonna start with the base step. Just watch my steps and mirror it”

The Dragon Slayer obediently complied, a little disappointed and surprised by the lack of music but knowing better than to argue with the bartender. As her foots moved, she started counting the steps rhythming them both. With the steady “one, two, three” getting out of her mouth, the sound of her heels on the wooden ground and what he could see of her foots out of her dress, Nastu quickly understood the pattern. It wasn’t so hard after all. 

But Mira accelerated a little, and tell him to look at her eyes, and everything went to hell. 

It was very hard. Without visual support, he kept tripping over his friends’ and his own foots. The increased speed had added his balance to the equation, and he had to think about every part of his body and the rhythm in less than half a second. 

“You think too much”

Sometimes, the fire magician wondered if Mira had learned mind reading magic on top of transformation. He stopped and took a step away from her, frustrated.   
“How am I supposed not to?”

Mirajane just smiled, patient as always. 

“Do you think when you fight? When you dodge an attack, do you think about how you’re supposed to move?”   
Natsu blinked twice. 

“Well, no. I just follow my instinct.” 

“Then think of it as if you were fighting with me, and just move so that we dodge each other. I’ll give the rhythm, rely on your instinct to move with it. Can you try that?”  
The boy heisted for a second before obediently put his hands back in dancing position.

By three in the morning Natsu had mastered the basic step plus some extra moves and was more and more confident in his dancing capacities. The bartender was right, it was a lot like fighting after all. 

But then, Mira decided to put music on. 

She took the old and immortal record player of the guild, got a disc apparently out of nowhere, and put it at work. 

And Natsu felt like he was back to step one. 

Not only the music was one more factor to focus on, but Mira now apparently assumed he knew what move she wanted to do, and just started it without telling anything.   
But he didn’t want to stop again because he was having trouble following. Now, he would keep trying until morning. 

Giving up just wasn’t in his nature. 

They were still dancing when Mira let a “don’t fight me” slip out of her mouth.

Natsu smirked. 

“You were the one who said it was like a fight.” 

The take over magician let go of his hand and did a turn, efficiently disturbing her dance partner before answering. 

“Fighting with me, not against me.”

The fire magician curled his lips. 

“I’m not good at fighting in team.” 

The woman whispered “Me neither” so law a normal human being probably wouldn’t have heard it. 

But Natsu was the son of a dragon, and by no way a normal human being. 

Yet he kept dancing. 

Because what could he said? What kind of word could possibly heal his friend’s fear and disgust of her powers? 

Before he could thing of anything, Mira started talking again, this time much louder. 

“I think you are good at fighting in team, trough” 

She let herself go down elegantly, letting Natsu mirror the move with more or less exactitude before continuing. 

“You wouldn’t do a mission alone, you always take at least Happy with you, right? And you like it better when you’re with Lucy and the team. You don’t like to see them fight, because even if you want to trust them and their fighting ability, you’re worried. But you’re good.” 

The fire master smiled, following his friend in the dance. 

“Are we making late night psychology?” 

Mira replied in a playful tone, mirroring the smile and the steps. 

“Maybe so.” 

“Well,” Natsu made his fellow guild member spin around his arm, “That’s not what I call fighting as a team. Did you see Sting and Rogue? Their way of doing things is so cool. That’s team fighting for you.” 

Mira let her body fall, trusting the other magician to held her. “This kind of bound takes years of training and mutual trust to grow. You won’t be like Sting and Rogue with anyone overnight. You just have to take it slowly. One step at a time. Like dancing.” After another spin, she added “See, you got it now!” 

Natsu smiled. 

“No thinking, just like fighting. I’m good at that.” 

Mira seemed to think for a moment, still moving around with grace, before she spoke again. 

“I do think when I’m fighting.” 

She let a long silence, troubled only by the music before adding. 

“I mean, I wish I didn’t, but I just can’t blind of everything. What if I can’t control the take over? What if I accidentally kill my enemy? What if there are casualties? I’m always thinking when I fight.” 

The woman let a sad smile draw itself on her face. 

“Sorry, I’m rambling.”

Natsu didn’t slow down their dancing, but his voice was unusually calm and soft when he murmured:

“Not at all. Keep going.” 

It was rare for the bartender to tell her feeling, and the fire magician felt like the dance had helped her open a little. They were both tiered, but he didn’t want to stop the moment.

“I just… I wasn’t like that before. We got Lisana back, and I wish everything could go back to the way it was, but it just can’t.”

Another silence went for a while before Natsu started talking again. 

“You might need to take one step after the other too. Don’t force things and just give yourself and your family some time.” 

Mira let out a small laugh. 

“Using my own advice against me? Smart, Natsu.” 

As the music ended, she extracted herself from the boy, returning behind her counter. 

“Well, the sun is rising, the guild will reopen soon, and you have a quest to go to.” 

Natsu looked over the window. Sure enough, the first rays of warm morning sun were entering the room. 

“Woh. Is it that late already?”

Mira smiled, preparing for the bar for opening. 

“Feel ready to impress Lucy with your dancing style yet?” 

The fire magician stopped himself at the door. 

“Yeah, I… Thanks, Mira.”

She waved her hand. 

“Don’t keep your team waiting, and have a nice trip.”

As he made an overly exaggerated disappointment noise, partially because he just realized he would have to take the train, partially because it made Mira laugh, Natsu allowed himself to think that everything would be okay soon. 

They just needed some time, and to take it slow. 

One step after the other.

**Author's Note:**

> Uh… I hope that was good and not too much out of character. Thank you for reading.


End file.
